Watch Your Mail Box starting today if you live in York Region and Nov 03 if you live in Durham Region The new assessment notices that will be part of the equation in determining your property tax bill in 2009 are in the mail. Notices of re assessment started being sent out for the week of Sept 15th thru till Nov. 17th according to the Municipal Property Assessment Corporations (MPAC) web site  It is estimated that Provincial property values have risen on average approximately 20% since the last assessment, this increase will be phased in over a four year period resulting in a 5% increase in the Provincial average this year. This does not mean that the average assessed home in a given municipality such as Georgina or Uxbridge will see a 5% increase as it is based on a provincial average ... 09/22/2008

In looking at some Mill Rates Around the Greater Toronto Area and in Particular Uxbridge and Georgina I noticed a few peculiarities. While most areas have two different mill rates for residential and multi residential not all do. Some even have four different mill rates with the additional divisions being residential urban and residential rural It is interesting to note that the Multi Residential mill Rate in the York Region Communities I checked were all higher than the Residential while in Durham Region they were both the same. For example Georgina, which is in York Region has a residential rate of 1.395088 and the same for Multi residential Uxbridge, Which is in Durham Region has a residential rate of 1.295688 and Multi residential rate of 2.189644 What I found most interesting was M... 09/18/2008

August 22nd to Aug 24th The 19th annual Eaglewood Folk Festival is ramping up to present some great Canadian talent in this years festival. While in the past the festival has had talent from across North America they are sticking to Canadian talent this year and have lined up some great performers. Eaglewood is totally Wheelchair accessible and even has Braille program Guides. If you cant make it to the festival The University of Toronto member driven radio station CIUT 89.5 fm will be broadcasting live from 1pm to 11pm on Saturday or on-line at www.ciut.fm "Folk" music as presented at the festival is said to be "the kind of music you might play at a party, songs you can jam on and have a good laugh afterwords. Good Music by good people" This years line up of talen includes Brent Titcom... 08/22/2008

In my post You and "YOUR" Propertry Tax Bill -- Who Takes The Biggest Bite?  Steve commented "The Assessments have been frozen so, any increase recently in your taxes is down to your local council. The CVA, while unpopular is actually the better way of calculating property values and lets face it, thats all they do,...calculate your value. Blame your local Councillors for tax increases as they set the tax rate." His response is similiar to what one might expect to recieve from the Assessment Office and is what one sees if one takes a very narrow look at assessment. However one needs to look at the total picture to determine if it is a better way, or not, and to see what affect it has on your tax bill. As a taxpayer your ability to change the amount of taxes you pay is limited to getting... 07/09/2008

Understanding Your Property Tax Bill,how it is calculated and how it relates to other tax bills in your neighbourhood and in neighbouring communities just might become increasingly important to you. The province has given the go-ahead to reassess every home in Ontario for your 2009 tax bill. Your 2009 tax bill will be calculated based on the assessed value of your home in January of 2008. The Two Main Componentsof your tax bill are the assessed value and the mill rate. The the mill rates that are applied are set by 3 different bodies while the assessment or assessed value is set by MPAC (Municipal Property Assessment Corporation).  The three taxing bodieswho benefit from the taxes you pay, are:  1-the Town/Township,  2 - the Region, and  3 - the Education System. Your Tax Bill Is Calcul... 07/08/2008

The Seventh Annual Purple Turtle Art Festival With it's ideal location, stretching along the south shore of Lake Simcoe, the various communities of Gerogina are host to many events that are a draw to this tourist orientated town. In the winter there is always snowmobiling, ice fishing and of course the Canadian Ice Fishing Championship. In the summer there's boating and angling along with The Blue Bridge Festival The Eaglewood Folk Festival, the Georgina Studio Tour and of course the Purple Turtle Art Festival   July 11th 3-8 July 12 10-8 July 13th 11-4 2008 The Briars Resort Jackson's Point, Ontario A Funky Little Purple Turtle is the symbol of the festival and is used to lead you to the festival Mark the dates in your calendar now so you won't forget this opportunity to see some outst... 06/16/2008